Thursday, May 30, 2013

South Jersey Black Bear Safe, Tranquilized

This photo, courtesy of Moorestown police, shows a black bear in Strawbridge Lake earlier this week. A black bear has been roaming the area lately and is now believed to be treed in Delran Thursday morning.

A black bear that has been roaming the suburbs of South Jersey (in the shadow of the Philadelphia skyline) has been captured and tranquilized by New Jersey wildlife officials who say the bear will be relocated to a less populated area.
Black bear are not uncommon in the northwest part of the state but they are not often spotted in South Jersey. Still, bears have been spotted at one time or another in every New Jersey county and the southern portion of the state contains the pinelands which is a vast, preserved natural area.
The bear (shown above in a photo taken by Moorestown police) cavorted for awhile yesterday in a Burlington county lake next to a heavily-used park area and not far from a major highway.
Today the bear showed up in nearby Delran near an apartment complex and when spotted quickly scurried up a tree. Police and firefighters were fast to the scene as a crowd gathered. They surrounded the bear and then biologists from the state Division of Fish and Wildlife tranquilized the bear. A short time later it fell into a net set up under the tree.
The bear is believed to be a male and is quite large. State officials have not said where his new home will be.

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